Waypoint Residential has announced the final closing of its subsidiary’s inaugural closed-end commingled fund with $103 million in Fund I equity. This fund closing marked the end of a highly active 2021 for Waypoint, which drove $1.94 billion in total investment activity across the U.S., including $661 million across 10 acquisitions and $1.28 billion across 23 sales.
Fund I’s capital will be deployed on strategic multifamily investments in the Sunbelt, a region in which Waypoint sees a longer-term housing boom being accelerated by the pandemic and residential migrations.
The closing of Fund I builds on Waypoint’s decade-long track record of successful multifamily investing. Founded in 2011, the firm has invested in more than 31,000 apartment units, representing approximately $5 billion in total investment activity in both value-add acquisitions and ground-up development. In that time, Waypoint has also sold 77 investments, generating more than $3.2 billion in proceeds to investors.
“I am proud of what we have accomplished in our first decade,” said Scott Lawlor, CEO, Waypoint and the Waypoint General Partner. “Investing is always challenging, and this has recently been underscored by the unprecedented economic challenges presented by the pandemic. The key to our continued success is having a strong team of experienced, aligned, empowered and motivated people. I am excited by our current team’s ability to continue expanding our history of excellent client service and investment returns.”
Waypoint is now in the market with its second closed-end commingled fund offered by a second subsidiary general partner, Waypoint Strategic Sunbelt Apartment Fund II, LP, which is seeking to raise $200 million in equity. Fund II will continue to focus on development in the Sunbelt. Waypoint believes the best risk-adjusted returns are currently achieved by delivering new, well-amenitized assets in Sunbelt markets where housing supply has not kept pace with outsized population and employment growth. Fund II is designed to appeal to both mid-sized institutional and private investors that have historically had limited opportunities to invest in a diversified pool of high-quality apartment developments.
“Larger institutional investors have been able to gain exposure to development by partnering with merchant builders while private capital has often invested through syndications,” said Reagan Pratt, Head of Capital Markets, Waypoint. “There has been a gap in the investment market, forcing mid-sized institutional investors and private capital either to forgo development altogether or accept asset concentration risk to gain exposure to multifamily development. Fund II fills a tremendous void, as investors will be investing alongside an experienced, diversified, vertically-integrated developer, while avoiding the allocator/operator dual fee double promote structure common elsewhere in the market in allocator funds.”
